‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’ Tops the Weekend Box Office

Although it was the smallest opening of any Spider-Man movie in history, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse still easily topped the weekend box office. Its $35.4 million debut was also the biggest ever for an animated movie released in December.

Into the Spider-Verse also got a rare A+ from CinemaScore voters, suggesting its word of mouth through the holiday season should be strong. It will face competition next weekend though, with both Aquaman and Mary Poppins Returns hitting theaters and fighting for comic book fans and families’ dollars.

It was also a good weekend for Clint Eastwood, whose new film, The Mule, debuted with $17.2 million — Eastwood’s second biggest opening of this century (after his smash American Sniper). The other big release of the weekend — Mortal Engines, from producer/writer Peter Jackson — grossed just $7.5 million against a reported budget of over $100 million. Meanwhile the PG-13 version of Deadpool 2, Once Upon a Deadpool grossed just $2.6 million, compared with the $125.5 million opening weekend the original R-rated cut had last spring.

The best per-screen average of the weekend belonged to If Beale Street Could Talk, the new movie from Moonlight director Barry Jenkins. On four screens around the country it grossed $219,714, for an average of $54,794.